Operation: Austin

Chapter Three Part Four

She hit cosmetics and personal items first. Then, they picked out dresses, pants, tops, bras, panties, shoes, and a couple of bathing suits. The one-piece was sexy and covered the essentials. The other one was a very skimpy pink bikini with a crocheted bra. Just seeing it held up to her breasts as she looked at it made him lightheaded. Two hours later, they had two carts full of clothes, amounting to a complete wardrobe.

As they were checking out, the clerk kept looking at them, obviously curious about their status and Paige’s injuries. “My niece,” he explained. “She hurt herself surfing in California, and she is going to stay with me a while as she heals. She came straight up from LA, and she doesn’t have any clothes here.”

The woman was Latina, about twenty-five years old, very good-looking, and full-figured. Her vibe told him she was up for the game. “Uh-huh,” she said sarcastically, looking at the stack of clothes and not fooled by his story. She looked him in the eye, smiled, and asked boldly, “You need another niece? I could use an uncle like you.”

Paige reached over and took his arm in hers. “Sorry, he’s full up on nieces.”

She batted her bruised eyes and smiled directly and possessively at the cashier. Gary’s heart did a little flip-flop. Well, that’s interesting, he thought.

The two women were joking, but there was a definite undertone. The cashier had opened a door that Paige slammed back shut. Paige was not letting another woman into her territory.

The cashier chuckled. “Thought so.”

The two girls laughed as they shared the joke. While Gary was using his card, she smiled at Paige, “Have fun with your uncle.”

Gary smiled and shook his head; Paige laughed and waved goodbye. Walking away from the cashier, he looked at her. “How old are you again?”

She cast him a sexy, albeit crooked grin and slipped her arm back through his, so it rested against her breast. She put a little extra wiggle in her walk. “I’m old enough. Uncle Gary.” She put an obvious emphasis on the word uncle, and he rolled his eyes.

As they made their way to the car, pushing a cart piled with bags, she glanced at him. They had just spent a couple of hours and more than $1800 shopping together, which shocked her. He had coached and encouraged her the entire way, buying her cosmetics, intimates, jewelry, dresses, and shoes. They were easing into comfort zones. Friends, flirt-mates, with a hint of s****l tension between them. She sensed he was not predatory, and she remembered the stories of Pygmalion and My Fair Lady.

She wondered as she glanced at him, Am I his Liza Doolittle? Well, if I am, that story ended up okay…

He enthusiastically helped her choose the clothes and accessories that he wanted to see her in. The thought touched her. She was not used to someone taking care of her like this, wanting her to feel good about herself and how she looked when she was with him. She honestly appreciated what he was doing to help her forget what she had gone through, distracting her from it and letting her feel beautiful instead of dirty.

As they pulled out of the parking lot onto the street, she repeated, “Thank you so much. I can’t believe you did that! You’d better be careful. You might not be able to get rid of me.” Instantly, she blushed, knowing what she had implied.

He just smiled and said, “Promises, promises.” Their eyes met, and the spark was alive. He won that round, but only because, embarrassing herself, she momentarily lost control. Neither of them knew what this was or where it would go, but they were both having fun, and it was what he wanted right then. He wanted Paige to have fun. With the trunk and the back seat full of bags, they pulled onto Highway 82 and headed north. In forty-five minutes, they would be home, and they were both ready to have this trip over for the day.

“We should be at the farm a little after five-thirty. I need a beer and some fajitas!”

Paige smiled and agreed. “I need a shower and a change of clothes. Then I’ll join you for those fajitas and maybe some wine if that’s okay?”

He turned up the music; Qodes was playing ‘Poison.’ Soon, the car was crossing the canyon bridge and eating up the miles through the desert hills toward Ellensburg.

“What are you thinking?” he asked. “What do you want to ask me that you have been waiting for?”

She smiled thoughtfully. “Not waiting, really. I’m just curious about your house and what I’m supposed to do there. I left everything behind in McCall with nothing to go back to. I went to Las Vegas with plans. Now they are all gone, and I have no idea what my life is about. Oddly enough, I’m not freaked out about that; I think coming so close to a horrible future has changed how I view things. I feared that I was headed for a life of drugs, prostitution, abuse, disease, and early death. I thought about it a lot when I was locked in that room, tied up, waiting for some pimp to come to buy me from those guys. Then they told me I was going to the Middle East! I was so scared, but then everything changed. Within twenty-four hours, I’m riding in a fantastic car full of new clothes with an amazing guy, going to a house with a housekeeper. It’s all a little surreal at this point.”

She thought for a minute, then turned to him and asked a question he could tell had been on her mind. “How long am I going to stay with you? Can I leave when I want?”

He looked at her in surprise. “Paige, you aren’t a prisoner. You are free to stay or go anytime. Just say the word, and I’ll buy you a ticket to any place you want. I just hope you give yourself a chance to get healed and make plans. As far as how long you can stay with me, I haven’t even thought about that yet. I have a big house, and there is a great college nearby. Maybe you want to go back to school or work? Let’s just take it one day at a time and see what happens.”

She not only found that reassuring, but she had never dreamed someone would offer her this kind of an option. It was overwhelming.

“I like that plan. I’ll take it one day at a time, then.”

He smiled as he teased her, “Can we go back to the part where you were telling me I’m an amazing guy?”

She looked over at him, her lips pursed. He thought he had caught her, but she was quicker. “Well, you know, in a purely academic, theoretical way.”

He chuckled, “I’ll take that, for now.”

She was back on top. He was okay with that, too. As they came over the crest of the pass, she could see the Ellensburg valley before them. She commented that she had never been there. Then she laughed. “Who am I kidding? Other than a few trips to Boise with the volleyball and cross-country teams, I’d never been out of McCall until I went to Vegas.”

She was surveying the countryside as they exited and drove east on the surface roads to his home.

He motioned to the farms they were passing through. “As you can see, we don’t live in town. I like privacy and space, and I like that Jax can hear anybody approaching for a mile; I have sensors all around the farm, but he’s almost as good; not much gets past him.”